.
6. Correspondence from Claimant’s counsel, dated April 18, 2008, with
attachment.On January 3, 1996, William Beason was found stabbed to death in his
home on Chili Avenue in the City of Rochester, New York. On January 4, 1996,
Claimant Douglas Warney contacted the Rochester Police Department and indicated
that he had information for the Police. Rochester Police Officer Sandra Adams
was dispatched to Claimant’s address and interviewed Claimant that evening
in his home. At that time, Claimant indicated that he was familiar with the
victim and that he had been to the victim’s apartment before. He also
stated that he knew the murderer. During that and subsequent interviews with
police, Claimant lied to police and attempted to frame his cousin, Brian
Szymkowski, for the murder. He indicated that he had been at the victim’s
house shoveling snow when his cousin, who was owed money by the victim, broke
down the door and entered the house. Claimant said that he heard screaming but
did not enter the house. Later, Claimant indicated that he had entered the
house. Upon further questioning, he admitted that he had assisted his cousin in
the murder of Mr. Beason. Finally, he admitted that he had murdered Mr. Beason
on his own and that his cousin was not involved.
Claimant signed a detailed, written confession containing what Claimant insists
are facts that only the police and the true perpetrator could possibly have
known. Things such as an awareness of the layout and furnishing of the interior
of the victim’s house and knowledge of what the victim was cooking at the
time he was murdered. In his confession, Claimant also indicated that he had
stabbed the victim many times and that he himself had been cut in the struggle
and that he cleaned the knife off with tissue paper before leaving.
After Claimant had given this confession, and while he was being booked, an
officer uninvolved with the investigation of the murder, one Corporal Dreeson,
saw Claimant and asked how he was doing. Without any direct questioning and
unprompted, Claimant declared “not good . . . I got a body.”
Claimant was tried for the murder of Willaim Beason and, on February 12, 1997,
was found guilty of two counts of murder in the second degree. On February 27,
1997, he was sentenced to two concurrent terms of imprisonment of 25 years to
life. Mr. Warney served more than nine years of this sentence when, in May of
2006, DNA evidence ruled Claimant out as the perpetrator and incriminated
another individual. This individual, Eldred Johnson, confessed to the crime and
indicated that he did it alone. Based upon this DNA evidence and the confession
of Eldred Johnson, Claimant’s conviction was overturned and, on May 16,
2006, Claimant was released from prison.
In his claim, filed on February 13, 2008, Claimant alleges a cause of action
for unjust conviction under Court of Claims Act (“CCA”) § 8-b.
According to Claimant, he was coerced into giving the confession by members of
the Rochester Police Department (“RPD”). He alleges that the DNA
evidence and the confession of Eldred Johnson demonstrate beyond a reasonable
doubt that he was innocent of the crimes for which he was convicted. More than
this, Claimant argues that this exculpatory evidence demonstrates that his
confession was coerced by members of the RPD. He seeks $10,000,000.00 to
compensate him for the more than nine years he spent in prison for a crime he
did not commit.
With this motion, filed in lieu of an Answer, Defendant seeks dismissal of the
claim, arguing that Claimant cannot meet the statutory requirements necessary to
support such a claim. Court of Claims Act § 8-b[4] provides:
It is this latter provision that is at issue here. Specifically, Defendant
alleges that through his confession, as well as other actions, Claimant caused
or brought about his own conviction. Accordingly, Defendant argues that,
because Claimant cannot demonstrate by clear and convincing evidence that he did
not cause or bring about his conviction, he is barred from recovery under the
statute, and the claim should be dismissed.
Claimant’s counsel has pointed out that “there is no [pleading]
requirement that claimants attach documentary proof that they did not cause or
bring about their convictions” (Claimant’s brief in opposition, par.
13). While technically true, it is equally true that, under the statute, a
court should dismiss the action if it finds that a claimant is not likely to
succeed at trial in proving by clear and convincing evidence that he did not
cause or bring about his conviction (Mike v State of New York, 11 Misc 3d
384; Ausderau v State of New York, 130 Misc 2d 848). Accordingly,
Defendant correctly argues that Mr. Warney’s claim should be dismissed if
it appears that he will be unable to meet this burden.
At first blush, of course, the answer to this question seems obvious. Claimant
gave a specific and detailed written confession to the crime. There is no doubt
that this confession contributed to Claimant’s conviction. Claimant
argues, however, that because his confession contained information that Claimant
could not possibly have known, his confession was obviously the product of
misconduct and coercion on the part of the police officers that secured it.
Therefore, Claimant argues, because the confession was not voluntary, it cannot
be used by Defendant to demonstrate that Claimant caused or contributed to his
own conviction. Following this line of reasoning, Claimant argues that the
confession was the centerpiece of the prosecution against Claimant and, as the
confession fails because it was coerced, so does any evidence that Claimant
caused or contributed to his own conviction.
To counter this argument, Defendant argues that the confession was tested at a
Huntley hearing prior to Claimant’s criminal trial, and that Monroe County
Supreme Court Justice Harold L. Galloway determined specifically that the
confession was not coerced. More than this, however, Defendant points out that
the voluntariness of the confession was tested again after the trial, first at
the Supreme Court level with Justice Donald J. Mark (Ramsay Affirmation, dated
March 13, 2008, Exhibit C) and then at the Appellate Division, Fourth Department
(People v Warney, 299 AD2d 956). Defendant argues that, because the
Appellate Division determined that the State had demonstrated that the
confession was voluntary by clear and convincing evidence, Claimant cannot
possibly demonstrate that it was involuntary by the same standard.
A similar situation occurred in Duval v State of New York (Ct Cl,
October 4, 2002 [Claim No. 105548, Motion Nos. M-64867, M-65282, CM-65283],
Patti, J., UID No. 2002-013-034). In Duval, the claimant argued that he
should be permitted to demonstrate that he did not cause or contribute to his
own conviction by testing the voluntariness of his confession in the Court of
Claims. That confession had been determined to be voluntary in both a pretrial
Huntley hearing and a post-trial habeas corpus proceeding in the United States
District Court for the Western District of New York. Judge Patti denied
Claimant’s request, stating: “In the circumstances presented here,
the voluntariness of Claimant’s confession is not something that this
Court has the power to determine anew” (Duval v State of New York,
supra). Claimant finds an apparent contradiction between Judge
Patti’s determination in Duval and a subsequent decision of the
Hon. S. Michael Nadel in Cortes v State of New York (Ct Cl, April 15,
2005 [Claim No. 108167], UID No. 2005-014-002). However, that case did not
involve a post-trial determination on the voluntariness of the confession.
Judge Nadel merely noted the clearly established fact that the finder of fact is
not bound by a pretrial Huntley hearing determination.
I find that, although Claimant has presented evidence clearly demonstrating
that his confession was false, the evidence presented does not also indicate
that it was coerced. Although Claimant alleges that only the police and the
true perpetrator could have known many of the factual details contained in the
confession, I am not convinced. First, I note that, prior to being exonerated
by the DNA evidence and the confession of Eldred Johnson, Claimant consistently
argued that the confession was obviously false because his descriptions of the
specifics concerning the crime were too inconsistent with what police knew
actually happened. Now, Claimant argues that the information was so specific
and exact that only the true murderer and the police could have known it.
Second, Claimant had been to the victim’s house on previous occasions and
was familiar with the victim. He may have been there on the day of the murder.
It is, therefore, not surprising that, even though Claimant did not commit the
murder, he was able to provide details that the general public would not
know.
Apart from pointing to the nature of the information contained in the
confession, Claimant does not indicate how he was coerced by police to give a
false confession. Moreover, Claimant argues that it was misconduct by the two
interrogating officers, Investigator Evelyn Beaudrault and Sergeant John Gropp,
that resulted in the false confession and Claimant’s conviction.
Claimant’s theory is not that tidy, however, as it does not account for
other damaging statements Claimant made to other members of the RPD.
It should be noted that Claimant’s contact with the RPD was initiated
by Claimant, who was attempting to frame someone else for the murder. Officer
Sandra Adams testified at trial that she interviewed Claimant in his own home on
January 4, 1996. She described Claimant as very cooperative. At the time of
the interview, she was unaware of the nature of the information Claimant wanted
to give her, but knew that he had been a reliable source of information in the
past. She testified how Claimant falsely tried to implicate his cousin Bryan
Szymkowski in the crime. Mr. Warney also told Officer Adams that the victim had
been cooking on the day he was murdered. This information was provided by
Claimant before Officer Adams even knew what crime or what victim he was talking
about and before Claimant’s allegedly coercive interrogation by Beaudrault
and Gropp.
Moreover, Claimant’s spontaneous statement to Police Corporal Dennis
Dreeson that “I’ve got a body” was presented to the jury.
Several witnesses at the trial testified that, in their experience, that phrase
was street slang meaning that Claimant had murdered someone. Therefore, the
jury could have reasonably inferred that Claimant was, again, confessing to the
crime. To suggest that the information Officer Adams provided and the
spontaneous statement Corporal Dreeson heard was fabricated, stretches the
bounds of credulity. It would mean that, in addition to the alleged improper
interrogation tactics, the RPD was also involved in a much larger conspiracy to
frame Mr. Warney. And this conspiracy included not just the two officers
investigating the murder, but also Officer Adams and Corporal Dreeson.
Court of Claims Act § 8-b was created to prevent injustice by carving out
a way for a person with clean hands to recover for the injustice of his or her
false imprisonment. The statute was not designed to permit one to benefit from
his own improper actions. As the Law Revision Commission stated in its report
to the legislature when it proposed the statute, it is important to
“ensure that one is not rewarded for his own misconduct”
(McKinney’s 1984 Session Laws of New York at p. 2932). The statute offers
a list of examples of conduct that would prevent a claimant from recovering for
unjust conviction. These include: 1) falsely giving an uncoerced confession;
2) inducing a witness to give false testimony; and 3) concealing the guilt
of another person. While Claimant argues he fits into none of these
categories, I note that the list is not meant to be exhaustive. I find that by
his own actions, which included calling the police to tell them he had
information about the murder, trying to frame an innocent man for the crime, and
in volunteering that he had “a body” to Corporal Dreeson, Claimant
did cause or bring about his own conviction. In Moses v State of New
York (137 Misc 2d 1081, 1086), the Hon. Gerard M. Weisberg stated
“[W]here a claimant through misconduct has incited another to false
accusations of murder are his hands clean enough to reach into the public till
for recompense. We think not.” Here, Claimant himself made false
allegations of murder against his cousin. His hands were, therefore, no less
dirty than those of Mr. Moses.
For the reasons stated above, I find that it does not appear that Claimant can
meet the stringent statutory requirements necessary to recover under Court of
Claims Act § 8-b.
Accordingly, it is hereby
ORDERED, that Defendant’s motion for dismissal of the claim is
granted. The claim is dismissed in its entirety.
